She's not interested -- He won't take the hint

The ongoing farce over the non-relationship between Chris and Clare has caused
Clare a significant amount of irritation, she explained to Sarah and Kate.
Ever since the new term began two weeks ago, Chris has been dogging Clare like
"some kind of love-sick puppy".  His continual enquiries as to whether she
would like to go for a drink, see a film, or come out to the union, cannot be
interpreted as anything other than ham-fisted attempts to ask her out. 

"I'm trying to be as clear as I can," said Clare.  "I give some excuse, like
I'm busy, or I'll get back to him, and then I never do.  From that it should be
pretty clear that I'm not interested in going out with him.  I don't think I
could be any more direct, short of telling him to his face that I'm not
interested in going out with him."

In an unprecedented outburst, Kate interjected, "Why don't you tell him
directly that you're not interested?"  She then hurriedly added, "No, I'm being
stupid -- forget that I said that."  Various strategies were then discussed,
from avoiding communal areas to the more extreme idea of finding "some dumb
blonde to date Chris and leave me alone".  Sarah suggested that they could take
a leaf from Chris' book, and fabricate a fictional jealous ex-boyfriend for
Clare, but a flaw in this scheme was pointed out by Clare: that it was too damn
stupid for words.

Eventually, Clare concluded that her best option was to carry on ignoring Chris
and hope that he gets over it soon.  She hopes that some other girl will get
drunk and kiss Chris and take the heat off her or something.